Somali Internet company on U.S. list of companies with suspected terror list shuts down

By OSMAN HASSAN The Associated Press 11/22/01 5:42 PM

MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) -- Somalia's only Internet company was forced to close it offices Thursday, two weeks after appearing on a U.S. list of organizations with suspected links to terrorism.

Somali Internet Co. shut down after the United Arab Emirates' state-owned Internet service, Etisalat, canceled its international access, said Abdulkadir Hassan Ahmed Kadleh, administrator for the Somali firm.

"I first thought it was a technical problem, but then when I called the Etisalat company in Dubai, the engineers informed us that it was an intentional freeze down," Kadleh told The Associated Press.

Somali Internet Co. is among 62 organizations and people the United States believes are funneling funds for international terror suspect Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaida network. The list was issued Nov. 7.

The Mogadishu-based firm, created in 1998, is jointly owned by three Somali companies -- Telecom Somalia, NationLink and Al-Barakaat. It has offices throughout southern Somalia.

Al-Barakaat, Somalia's largest company, also is on the list and was forced to close its financial businesses, including a money transfer service vital to hundreds of thousands of impoverished Somalis, after its assets were frozen.

On Nov. 14, it also closed its international telephone service after U.S.-based Concert Communications, a joint venture between AT&T and British Telecom, cut off its international gateway.

Al-Barakaat and Somali Internet Co. officials denied having links to terrorism.

"This Internet company has nothing to do with terrorism," said Abdulaziz Haji, managing director of Telecom Somali. "It was losing money and it's only this year it just covered itself, so how can it provide somebody else with money?"

Etisalat officials could not be contacted for comment Thursday.

The Horn of Africa nation's banking and telecommunications systems collapsed during the decade of clan-based fighting that followed the ouster of dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991.

A transitional government elected in August 2000 but has yet to re-establish state institutions. In the meantime, private companies have offered some of Africa's cheapest phone services.

"Many people are now losing their jobs, others will suffer because the services are now in a total stagnation," Somali Internet customer Mohamed Ali Farah said. "We will have to go back to the old days of using fax and expensive telephones so as to transmit our messages."

-- Anonymous, November 22, 2001